Why Don't the Chinese Play Cricket? Rethinking Progression in Historical Interpretations through the British Empire

Mastin, Steven; Wallace, Pieter

Teaching History, n122 p6-14 2006

Let's stop saying sorry for the Empire! Thus Mastin and Wallace introduce one of their lessons on interpretations of the British Empire. They develop Gary Howells's ideas from the previous edition of "Teaching History" to demonstrate exactly what we might get our students to do with interpretations of the past. They produce an enquiry which effectively builds up their students' knowledge of the multiple periods which they need to have in mind at once when writing on historical interpretations. They then get Year 9 to engage with Niall Ferguson by placing him in his social and historiographical context. This article is worth attention for the lessons it presents alone, but it also provides a rigorous theoretical progression-based model of true interpretations teaching, moving on the debate ignited some years ago by Tony McAleavy. [A combined list of references and notes is provided.]